


Auribus Teneo Lupum

by fouroux



Category: U2
Genre: Angst, Blow Jobs, Established Relationship, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 07:17:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7304824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fouroux/pseuds/fouroux
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He knew the chords, he knew that song; he had written the notes down himself and played them countless of times, but he had made a mistake and he shouldn't have.</p>
<p>Set in 1997.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Auribus Teneo Lupum

The silence after a show was deafening.

The car hummed steadily, traffic rushed past over a wet street, and Edge could hear the rain whip against the windows and the repetitive sound of the wipers past the post-gig tinnitus in his ears as he sat in the back, but it was too quiet. His fingers drummed against his knee cap, strumming invisible strings, and he knew that song by heart, but he had hit the wrong note during the bridge, and Edge couldn't recall why. An hour later and it bothered him still, a twisting little knot of micro snakes right between his ribs, and he knew it would stay there until the next gig. It didn't matter, really. A third of the stadium hadn't been there to hear it anyway, but the band had heard it, and he had heard it, and somehow that was the worst of it.

Edge had let him down.

He could still picture it; the wild look of surprise on Bono's face when the note had cut awkwardly through the song, neck tense with the strain of a failing voice, and his hand gripping the microphone like a lifeline attached to nothing as his rock in the storm momentarily sank. Flinching back from his own mistake, Edge had struggled, fingers moving around the false note and dragging the song back above the surface. Just barely.

_Tap, tap, tap._ He knew the chords, he knew that song; he had written the notes down himself and played them countless of times, but he had made a mistake and he shouldn't have. _Tap, tap, tap._

Exhaling deeply to lessen the pressure in his chest, Edge forced himself to stop and it was an effort, smoothing his hand back over his knee, and the car couldn't get there fast enough. Edge wanted out. Out of this silence and into the safety of his hotel room, with the TV running loud enough to drown out the mantra in his head and a shower as cold as he could bear it, but as he turned his head he knew this wasn't how it was going to go.

There he sat, smaller than he was and leaner than he had ever been, and Edge followed traffic lights in red and yellow fly over a bare arm, up to a set of taut shoulders, until his eyes fell to a sharp jaw and a thumbnail between pink lips, and Edge had hoped tonight would be different. He reached out and gently pulled at Bono's wrist before it was too late, squeezing the length of his thumb and waiting for a reaction that didn't come. Mutely, Bono turned his attention to the window instead, lowering their joined hands to sit on the empty space between them, and it used to be enough. Edge looked down and away, things that were too hard to say stuck to the roof of his mouth like the stale smack after a hangover; an apology, a question, and the tip of his tongue contemplated every ridge along his palate until Edge figured it wasn't what either of them really wanted to hear right now, and so the silence dragged on until they were finally there.

He wasn't sure whether it was a good or bad thing, this new habit of theirs, this twisted coping mechanism, but it started to feel an awful lot like the latter. Edge dreaded the inevitability of it, and he had said yes too many times now to say no, and maybe next time he wouldn't let him in, but the thought alone made his stomach twist. Edge told himself they would return from it any day now, after a good gig, a good review in the papers, but North America hadn't been kind to them this time around, and things were as uncertain as they had never been.

“Edge.”

It was always the same. Edge didn't know why he had bothered with a drink this time around as he stood before the luxurious minibar in his softly lit hotel room made up of entirely too much cream-coloured furniture, staring at the array of fancy bottles, glasses and a bucket of ice before him. That first swallow hadn't been enough to steady his nerves anyway, and he could hear the door click shut and that familiar voice wrap around his name before he could take another sip to make sure it worked. Edge's eyes lingered on the golden liquor as he raised his glass halfway and paused; it was no use, he thought, his index finger drumming in patterns. _Tap, tap, tap._

“Edge.”

Sturdy hands dragged over printed on muscles, then along his ribs and down the straight line of his waist, and Edge remembered a touch as tender as this, how they used to be before Vegas; until teeth sank into the fabric of his shirt, digging into his shoulder with a soft growl, and flat palms grew into claws, and he wished he had taken that second sip, but he was too late now. There was a wolf at his neck, and Edge wanted him to devour him whole.

He turned in between the little space Bono granted him, glass in hand and hips bumping, and the heat of him was suffocating. Bono's body was still warm from the exertions of the show as he pressed up against Edge's frame, muscles taut like ropes beneath the tight black shirt, and his mouth starving, _starving_ , like an animal. The smell of him was dark and heavy, like too much testosterone, his bitter tongue clashing with the sour alcohol flavour on Edge's own. Edge had never felt a kiss sting the way this one did, and he found himself leaning in for more. Their mouths turned feral, Bono's teeth sharp against his bottom lip and chin, and Edge wanted him to make it bleed, to turn whiskey into copper, but Bono's shark-like kisses sank too soon. Down his throat, his collarbone and chest, nipping at the silver sequins of his stage outfit, and Edge didn't know why it always took so little these days, but he could feel the pulse deep down in his stomach, the pull and the pressure, and he blamed it on the left over adrenaline in his system while impatient hands tugged at his belt.

He watched, squinting past the haze as the minibar dug uncomfortably into the small of his back, his left hand stemming against it for support while his other remembered the glass of whiskey, and Edge downed it fast when the button popped and the zipper gave, and Bono sank to his knees like he would for a prayer.

Edge licked his lips, the tip of his tongue burning as it gathered up the remnants of his drink, and he hoped the alcohol would work fast as Bono pulled roughly at the waist of his jeans and underwear, past his hips and just enough. His erection bobbed free, warm and heavy and a deep, deep red as it curved upward. There was a moment there, a pause, and he watched Bono's features soften with rapture at the pure display of arousal before him, pupils wide and hungry, and pink lips caught in half a smile. It was temporary, only temporary, and Edge knew why and it pained him more than anything. He reached out, his fingertips delving through the prickling bristles of Bono's buzz cut, running up against the grain all the way to the back of Bono's head, and the simple satisfaction he got out of it somehow never ceased.

There was something he wanted to say, something meaningful, but as he opened his mouth to consider the right words Bono's head already inclined beneath his touch, and it all narrowed down to heat, so much wet heat, and whatever he had wanted to say died away in a helpless sob.

The empty glass dropped to the carpeted floor as he grappled for support and the furniture rattled with the force of it as Edge's body jerked back, then buckled, and he was sure someone must have heard. His mouth fell slack and his eyes shut while his breath hitched in his throat. It was too much too fast, the pressure maddening around his cock as it came and went, and Edge hadn't been entirely prepared. Not for any of it.

“ _Christ―_ ”

Bono moaned around his still hardening length, his mouth pliant and soft as it slid back and forth with keen efficiency, and it made Edge's stomach clench and his hand tremble at the top of Bono's head as he looked down and watched him take it with a dizzying appetite. There was an idea, an urge, and Edge knew he shouldn't, it wasn't fair, but it was so tempting, and he needed, he _needed―_

Bono gagged, and Edge felt instant horror shoot down his spine, but it was that power pooling in the pit of his stomach that peaked into a luring pulse; he knew he should stop, make sure Bono was okay, but he was there at the back of his throat, pushing against constricting muscles, and he couldn't help himself. He rocked his hips again, dipped back into the tight channel repeatedly until he found a rhythm that worked for him, and if he could stay forever in Bono's mouth he would. Bono choked against the assault on his reflexes, sloppy and violent, and Edge moaned right through it as he went; there was a _Sorry_ in there somewhere as he shook from the severity of his own selfish actions, hips snapping and spine tingling despite the guilt, but when Bono clung to his trembling thigh and the swell of his arse, succumbing to it with a familiar defiance, he knew.

Edge charged down that road with eager grunts past burning lungs and clenching teeth; it was going to be alright, he reasoned in an attempt to make sense of it, they were going to make it through and they would come out stronger like they always did. The world would love them again, he just had to believe in it. He hadn't meant to make a mistake, to disappoint him or anyone, really, and dear god, Edge wanted it to stop. He didn't want to keep doing this, it was obscene, it was wrong, but Bono wouldn't let him go, and he couldn't get enough, _he couldn't get enough_ as he fucked his mouth, again, again, and again, until he was there with a shout and a tear, and for a blindingly fluorescent moment he felt a little lighter . . .

 

“I'm sorry I fucked up the bridge,” Edge muttered not too long after as they sat on the carpet side by side, and they must've made quite the picture. The one pale and miserable, the other blood-shot and a mess, and both of them at a loss.

“It's okay,” Bono croaked, but no matter how often he cleared his throat, how many sips of whiskey he drank from the pretty bottle, the crack wouldn't leave his voice and it didn't for a long time. “I fucked up the rest.”

The silence returned, stretching on and on, and there was nothing left to say and too much to feel, and Edge reached out for Bono's hand and held it, held it tightly, and maybe tomorrow. Tomorrow things would change. His thumb ran over Bono's knuckles, one by one, four bones and three slopes, until it twitched and he couldn't make it stop, not today.

_Tap, tap, tap._   


 

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a while.
> 
> spacemonkey dreamt I published a story with a Latin title. Here it is, my darling.
> 
> Auribus Teneo Lupum: Literally means, “I grasp a wolf by the ears”. It’s supposed to convey a situation where you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t. In other words, grabbing on to the wolf’s ears or letting go could both end in disaster.
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks to my beta and hero. I love you, Laura.  
> Any remaining mistakes are my own. None of this ever happened.


End file.
